I am a political activist who has worked and lived in the West Bank of the Occupied Palestinian Territories. This blog chronicles my time in Palestine and also provides news and analysis about Palestine and the situation on the ground in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.

Thursday, July 31, 2014

Dear friends,it has been announced there will a limited true for 72 hours. This announcement comes as the death toll in Gaza exceeds that of Operation Cast Lead. As of
31 July, Israel has now murdered more Palestinians in Gaza than they
did in Operation Cast Lead in 2008/2009. According to the Palestinian
Centre for Human Rights in Gaza(PCHR), Israel has now killed 1432 people
during its 24 day murder spree in Gaza. Of this number, 1219 are
civilian (85%) and 345 are children. Israel has injured 6511. According
PCHR, 1,417 Palestinians were killed and 5303 injured in Israel's 22 day
Operation Cast Lead.The tweets
included in this post are from the following journalists,
photographers and bloggers (click on their names to go to their
accounts) documenting the situation on the ground in Gaza:Belal- Gaza - Palestinian doctor working in Gaza. Mohammed Suliman -
Gazan blogger (see also his article on Gaza in Alkhabar)Dalia Hatuaq - Palestinian journalist Ayman Mohyeldin - Egyptian reporter, reporting for NBCSherine Tadros - Sky News journalist in Gaza Chris Morris - BBC journalist UNRWA - UN Relief and Works AgencyPierre Krähenbühl - Commissioner General UNRWAYou can read the earlier posts in this "Reporting from Gaza" series by clicking on the titles blow:

Over
the last three weeks I have spent an enormous amount of time on social
media following what is happening in Gaza and speaking with friends
there. I have lost count of the times I have just burst into tears
reading the accounts or viewing the images tweeted and posted by
ordinary Palestinians, doctors and media in Gaza.

However, I have made it a rule to try to avoid as much as possible reading
the comments in response to these posts because invariably many of them
are by Zionist hasbara (propaganda) trolls, shilling in defence of
Israel's massacres and regurgitating the standard Zionist talking points
of the Israeli government. No matter what horror or human tragedy is
reported, the suffering of their fellow human beings is either ignored
or worst still, at times, rejoiced in by these shills.

As a
political activist, I understand intellectually and politically why and
how this happens, but on a emotional level I just can not get my head
around how people can completely ignore the dire impact of this
murderous rampage against a largely defenseless population locked in an
open air prison for more than 8 years. I can't comprehend on an
emotional level, how people can ignore the suffering and trauma that is
being inflicted on 1.8 million people. As the death toll rises and more
children are killed, I can not comprehend on a human emotional level how
anyone, whatever your ideology or your politics, can turn a blind eye
to the horrors in Gaza.

Amongst the photos and posts, there
have been many bloody images but the ones that usually upset me the most
are not these ones, as horrible as they are. It is usually the ones
which show the simply humanity of the people of Gaza, as they try to
survive these horrible and harrowing times.

How can you not be
moved by images such as this one which was just tweeted this morning by
one of the Palestinian doctors, Dr Belal Dabour, working in Shifa Hospital in Gaza?

The death toll in Gaza has now exceeded that of Operation Cast Lead. As of 31 July, Israel has now killed more Palestinians in Gaza
than they did in Operation Cast Lead in 2008/2009. According to the
Palestinian Centre for Human Rights in Gaza (PCHR), Israel has now killed
1432 people during its 24 day assault
on Gaza. Of this number, 1219 are civilian (85%) and 345 are children.
Israel has injured 6511. According PCHR, 1,417 Palestinians were killed
and 5303 injured in Israel's 22 day Operation Cast Lead.Now more than ever the people of Gaza and Palestine need our voices. Please join the rallies, marches and actions in your city, please write letters to your local political representative, please join the Palestinian BDS campaign, please speak out at your church, community group and in your union, ask them to pass motions condemning the massacre in Gaza and ask them to support the BDS campaign.

And please remember, always, the humanity of the people of Gaza - that they are and always will be someone's beloved son or daughter, mother or father, grandparent, wife, husband, cousin, aunt, uncle, nephew, niece, friend and loved one. That their lives, like all lives, not matter what your religion, nationality, ethnicity or gender, are precious and that they are not just a statistic.

Tuesday, July 29, 2014

Dear friends,I am reprinting this very moving and eloquent account, published in the Huffington Post, written by Mohammed Suliman about
Palestinian sumoud (steadfastness) and defiance in Gaza and the demand for human dignity.

In the article Mohammed eloquently explains: "The
reality is that if Palestinians stop resisting, Israel won't stop
occupying, as its leaders repeatedly affirm.
The besieged Jews of the Warsaw ghetto had a motto "to live and die in
dignity." As I sit in my own besieged ghetto, I think how Palestinians
have honored this universal value. We live in dignity and we die in
dignity, refusing to accept subjugation".You can follow Mohammed on twitter: @imPalestine in solidarity, Kim **

Gaza is a tough place; it's tiny, overcrowded and besieged.
But the people are kind. The food is delicious, and the beach, though
filthy, allows us to pretend that we're free. The sunset at sea is a
spectacular scene, despite the Israeli warships dotting the landscape.
Take a stroll down the street, and you'll meet vendors, mostly young
children hawking their wares. Take a taxi, and by the time you get off,
you'll be exchanging phone numbers with your newest friend, the taxi
driver. Our markets are complete chaos, an experience for all
five senses. Rush hour is when school children, dressed in UNRWA
uniforms or Barcelona and Real Madrid t-shirts, finish classes and flood
the streets on their way back home. It is when I realize how young
Gaza's population is. Night is as lively a time as daytime. Smoke shisha
at a beach or downtown café or chill with the family. The people in
Gaza, too, are humans.But this isn't the scene in Gaza anymore.
The streets are deserted, and so is the beach. Schools have become
makeshift shelters crammed with displaced people fleeing death to a
supposedly safer place. The beautiful noise of life has been replaced by
a horrid one of death. Drones are humming overhead, and jet fighters
are roaring. There is always shelling at a distance. Distance,
however, is relative. It could be so close that your windows will be
blown out as you scream your heart out. Only then will you realize you
have just escaped a narrow death. But someone else must have inevitably
died. This could happen numerous times a day before you force yourself
to sleep in the dark in a safe corner of your house to the sound of
falling bombs and missiles, in the hope that none of these missiles will
know its way to you. The people in Gaza are living through yet another Israeli assault, the third such assault in six years,
with nowhere to flee. As missiles hit civilian houses, entire families
are obliterated. How else could one possibly characterize the killing of
twenty-five members from one family in one strike, or the killing of another eighteen members from another family
in just another strike? How can one describe the arbitrary and
indiscriminate shelling of one of the most crowded and impoverished
areas in Gaza City with endless barrages of missiles and mortar shells
all night long while preventing ambulances and civil defense forces from
entering the area to rescue and evacuate the victims?"We don't
target civilians," Israel tells us. "You're simply lying" should be a
sane person's response to these, at best, baseless claims. Israel does
target civilians with its sophisticated high-precision weapons, hence
the over 1,000 deaths in Gaza so far, 80 percent of whom are civilians, according to human rights groups. Over 200 children have been killed, some charred, others decapitated and many disemboweled. Israeli warships have killed four young children from Bakr family playing on the beach in broad daylight, an incident witnessed by NBC's reporter in Gaza Ayman Mohyedin. A sniper killed a distressed young man looking for his lost cousin amongst the debris in the wake of its unspeakable massacre in Al Shujayeh.Its unmanned drones killed two young brothers
from Areef family with a missile while they were on their way to buy
yogurt for their breakfast. In another incident, it fired missiles at
and killed three children feeding their pigeons and chickens
on the roof of their building. Israel has dropped thousands of tons of
explosives on one of the world's most densely populated areas, killing 26 members from Abu Jame' family in one airstrike, 20 members from Al Najjar family, 18 from Al Batsh family, nine from Al Qassas family, 7 from Al Keilani family, 8 from Kaware' family, five from Hamad family and on and on. These are the stories we hear as we wait death in the comfort of our home. A
ceasefire might be negotiated and agreed upon. Hamas might soon stop
firing rockets, but then will Israel cease to exercise its violence
against Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank on a daily basis? The
reality is that if Palestinians stop resisting, Israel won't stop
occupying, as its leaders repeatedly affirm. The besieged Jews of the
Warsaw ghetto had a motto "to live and die in dignity." As I sit in my
own besieged ghetto, I think how Palestinians have honored this
universal value. We live in dignity and we die in dignity, refusing to
accept subjugation. We're tired of war. I, for one, have had
enough of bloodshed, death and destruction. But I also can no longer
tolerate the return to a deeply unjust status quo. I can no longer agree
to live in this open-air prison. We can no longer tolerate to be
treated as sub-humans, deprived of our most basic human rights. We are
trapped here, trapped between two deaths: death by Israeli bombs and
missiles, and death by Israel's blockade of Gaza. We want to be
able to get in and out of Gaza freely, whenever we choose. Why should
our students not be granted their right to study at universities of
their own choice? Why should our patients be left for their own death as
Israel deprives them of receiving medical treatment in hospitals
outside of Gaza? Our fishermen want to fish in our sea waters without
the prospect of being shot at and killed. We deserve the right to access
clean water, electricity and our most basic needs. And yet we can't
because Israel occupies. It occupies not only our land but our bodies
and our destinies. No people can tolerate this injustice. We, too, are
humans.

Dear friends,once again more children have been killed by Israel as it bombs Gaza. We are now entering the third week of Israel's murderous assault on Gaza and the death toll is now in excess of 1180, most of whom are civilians, including more than 250 children. At least 6,800 Palestinians have been injured. On the very first day of Eid, 8 Palestinian children playing in park and on the street lost their lives, along with two adults, when Israeli military
drones carried out a strike. At the time eyewitness reported of two separate
strike assaults - one on Shifa Hospital and one on Al
Shati Refugee camp where the childen where. Palestinians and Western reporters on the scene gave eyewitness reports that the strike was carried out by Israeli drones. Israeli
Occupation Forces quickly attempted to shift the blame, saying both strikes
were caused by a failed rockets launched by Hamas. However, as Australian reporter Ruth Pollard later noted in a tweet, there was no evidence of Hamas rocket fragments to be found in the debris. Hamas also denied that they had fired a rocket which misfired.Al Jazeera, also published eyewitness accounts of the strike: According to Munzer al-Derby,
"The kids were playing on the wheel... A rocket fell and cut them
apart.""I know some of them. They were from Al-Helou family who left
their homes in Shujayea (east Gaza city, where massive artillery fire
destroyed neighbourhoods). They came here and rented an apartment last
week".
The tweets
included in this post are from the following journalists,
photographers and bloggers (click on their names to go to their
accounts) documenting the situation on the ground in Gaza. Ruth Pollard - Australian journalist with the Fairfax Media Dr Bassel Abuwarda - Palestinian doctor working in GazaMaram Humaid - Gazan blogger/tweeterAyman Mohyeldin - Egyptian reporter, reporting for NBCSharif Kouddous - Independent reporter, reporting for Democracy Now Tamer El-Ghobashy - Wall St Journal Middle East CorrespondentYou can read the earlier posts in this "Reporting from Gaza" by clicking on the titles blow:

For
Muslims, Laylat al-Qadr is the holiest night of Ramadan, which is the
holiest month in the calendar. This year, the night witnesses more
violent Palestinian deaths.Mohammed al-Araj (19) and Majd Sufyan (27) were killed on 24 July
when Israeli forces opened fire on more than 20,000 protesters in the
Occupied West Bank. One participant told Red Flag that more
than 1,000 Palestinian youth – both men and women – subsequently clashed
with Israeli soldiers. More than 280 Palestinians were injured as a
result of further Israeli military fire.The demonstration, the largest in almost a decade, called for
Palestinians to “deliver a message to Gaza people that you don’t stand
alone against this brutal offensive”. Anger also was fuelled by Israel’s
refusal to issue permits enabling West Bank Palestinians to pray at
al-Aqsa mosque.Beginning at al-Amari refugee camp two kilometres south of Ramallah,
the protesters had marched towards Qalandia, the main Israeli checkpoint
between Ramallah and Occupied East Jerusalem.Since the kidnapping, torture and murder of Palestinian teenager
Mohammed Abu Khdeir on 4 July, there have been daily confrontations and
protests in both Occupied East Jerusalem and throughout the Occupied
West Bank in cities such as Bethlehem.Palestinians in the West Bank staged a general strike on 21 July in
the wake of the Shejaiya massacre, during which Israel all but levelled
the eastern district of Gaza City, killing almost 100 people.
Palestinian shops, businesses and institutions closed their doors for
the day. According to the Palestine News Network more than 1,500
Palestinians took part in the demonstrations in Bethlehem.
Demonstrations also took place in Ramallah, Hebron, Nablus, Tulkarem and
Occupied East Jerusalem.Palestinian citizens of Israel also joined the general strike. In
Nazareth, the main commercial street was closed and up to 10,000
protested. Israeli police arrested at least a dozen demonstrators. Since
early July, the Israeli state has arrested more than 930 Palestinians
in both East Jerusalem and from Palestinian towns and districts inside
Israel.As news spread of the use of live ammunition and the deaths at the
Qalandia march, spontaneous protests broke out in Hebron, Bethlehem,
Tulkarem and Nablus. Protests also took place in Occupied East
Jerusalem, where Palestinians attacked and burned an Israeli military
post.For weeks the Fatah-dominated Palestinian Authority (PA) and its
police force have suppressed demonstrations in support of Gaza. Fatah
leader Mahmoud Abbas has refused to end “security coordination” with
Israel, describing it in May as “sacred”.In July, an increasing level of violence was used by the PA against
Palestinian demonstrators, including the use of weapons of the
occupation army – tear gas, sound grenades and live ammunition. Abbas
and the PA are viewed by many Palestinians, particularly the youth, as
little more than a “subcontractor for Israel”. In fact, amid the
anti-Israel demonstrations, there have also been demonstrations against
the PA police.Yet the growing outrage at PA collaboration resulted in a shift at
the end of July. Fatah’s Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigade – which has not
engaged in armed struggle in the Occupied West Bank for the past seven
years – claimed it had engaged in a fire fight with Israeli troops.
According to Palestinian media outlet Ma’an News, the gun battle took
place concurrently with the Qalandia march.The PA subsequently called for a “day of rage” on 25 July. Tens of
thousands of Palestinians joined demonstrations across the West Bank.
The biggest protests taking place in Jenin, Bethlehem and Nablus.
Israeli occupation forces killed seven and wounded hundreds more.In Abu Dis, on the outskirts of East Jerusalem, dozens of protesters
attempted to break holes in the apartheid wall. In Tulkarem, thousands
marched on Netanyah Checkpoint. In Bethlehem at least 3,000 people took
part in a rally that marched from Manger Square to the apartheid wall at
Rachel’s Tomb.

Sunday, July 27, 2014

Dear friends,a brief ceasefire has taken place. During this time, Palestinian families attempted to return to their homes, only to discover their homes no longer existed.

Many Gazan families spent the ceasefire trying to retrieve what belongings they could and sadly digging the bodies of their family members out of the rubble. So far more than 150 bodies have removed from the rubble of the cities that Israel destroyed. The number is expected to continue to grow.

Israel has now massacred more than 1050 people in its bloody and brutal assault on Gaza. Please join the rallies and actions in your cities to add your voice in protest against their actions. Please get involved in the Palestinian Boycott Divestment and Sanctions campaign and discuss with your church, place of worship, community group and union about joining the BDS campaign and passing motions condemning Israel's war crimes in Gaza. The
tweets included in this post are from the following journalists,
photographers and bloggers: (click on their names to go directly to
their twitter account):Hazem Balousha - Palestinian journalist working in GazaBelal- Gaza - Palestinian doctor working in Gaza. Noah Browning - Reuters journalistDaniel Rivers - ITV NewsKate Benyon-Tinker - BBC Jesse Rosenfeld - Independent Journalist in GazaISM Palestine - International solidarity activists in Gaza & West BankKelvin Brown - BBC journalist and photographer Tamer El-Ghobashy - Wall St Journal Middle East CorrespondentInternational Red Cross Agence France-Presse You can read the earlier posts in this "Reporting from Gaza" by clicking on the titles blow:

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About Me

I am an activist who, at different times over several years, has lived and worked as a international volunteer in the West Bank of the Occupied Palestinian Territories. This blog is an account of my time in Palestine and also carries original news, comment and analysis (as well as reprints) on Palestine. Live from Occupied Palestine campaigns for an end to Israeli apartheid and the brutal illegal occupation of the Palestinian people. You are welcome to reprint any material from this blog authored by Kim, however, please acknowledge the author and the blog website